Born Pietro Enrico Hoffman Landesman in Florence, Italy to German-Jewish parents, Pedro Friedeberg fled the war with his family to Mexico at the age of three. He describes his childhood as an unhappy one, and recalls being forced to learn the violin and several foreign languages. Artistic from a young age, Friedeberg was enthralled with the Gothic architecture of Florence and later, by the Aztec ruins in his adopted home-town of Mexico City. In 1957, he enrolled in the Universidad Iberoamericana to study architecture, however his studies were short lived. He found traditionalist Modernist designs boring and was more interested in creating fantastical structures than functional buildings. Encouraged by his friend and sculptor Mathias Goertiz, Friedeberg left university to pursue a career as an artist full time. He had his first solo exhibition at the age of twenty-two at Galería Diana in 1960 and began associating with other Surrealists and Neo-Dadaists, including Leonora Carrington and Alice Rahon, who also called Mexico City home. Together, they formed the group Los Hartos (The Fed-Up Ones) which was steeped in absurdist Dadaist traditions and focused singularly on making art for art’s sake. His most famous work, the Hand Chair came about almost as a joke after he was asked to give some work to Goertiz’s woodcarver in his absence. The resulting form has sold more than 5,000 copies since its inception. Aside from furniture design, Friedeberg is also an accomplished painter, his two dimensional works meld Op Art with Surrealism to create an aesthetic all his own. Known as one of the last great eccentrics, Friedeberg has exhibited widely in his time and his works reside in many public and private collections including the Museum of Modern Art, New York, the Museo de Arte Moderno, Mexico City, the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago and the Smithsonian Institute in Washington D.C.

Liberty & Co. is a famed British retailer renowned for its distinctive fabric designs, furnishings, and its historic association with Art Nouveau and the Arts and Crafts movements. Founded in 1875 by Arthur Lasenby Liberty in London, the company quickly established itself as a purveyor of luxury goods and eclectic textiles that celebrated craftsmanship and global artistry.




Arthur Liberty initially opened the store with the vision of bringing exotic goods from the East to the Victorian market, selling imported silks, ornaments, and decorative objects. The business grew rapidly, and by the 1880s, Liberty began producing its own line of fabrics, often inspired by Japanese and Oriental aesthetics. These became a hallmark of the store's identity. Liberty textiles, characterized by intricate floral patterns and innovative use of color, gained international acclaim, and by the late 19th century, the brand had become synonymous with the Art Nouveau movement, so much so that in Italy, Art Nouveau was referred to as Stile Liberty.




During the Arts and Crafts movement, Liberty further expanded its influence by collaborating with leading designers of the era, such as Archibald Knox and William Morris. The company offered furniture, homewares, jewelry, and metalwork that reflected the movement's emphasis on high-quality craftsmanship and natural forms. This alignment with progressive design philosophies cemented Liberty's reputation as a trendsetter in British design. The store's iconic Tudor Revival building, completed in 1924 on Great Marlborough Street, became a landmark in London. With its timber-framed façade and rich interiors, the space perfectly encapsulated Liberty's aesthetic ethos.




Liberty & Co. has continued to evolve over the decades, adapting to contemporary tastes while preserving its heritage. Its signature floral and abstract prints remain highly sought after in fashion and interior design. Today, Liberty operates as both a retailer and a design brand, with its textiles featured in collaborations with major fashion houses and designers worldwide. The enduring appeal of Liberty lies in its commitment to artistry, craftsmanship, and the celebration of global influences, making it a beloved institution in the history of British design.

Ed Ruscha is known for his detached, cool gaze over the American landscape, its vernacular and built environments. He is a leading voice in contemporary art, consistently subverting the aesthetic and conceptual conventions of photography and painting, as well as the mythic narratives surrounding American culture.




Ed Ruscha was born in Omaha, Nebraska in 1937 and grew up in Oklahoma City. He moved to Los Angeles in 1956 to attend what is now the California Institute of the Arts. Upon graduating in 1960, Ruscha began working in commercial advertising, putting him in contact with relationships between image and text and the language of consumerism and popular culture. Ruscha’s early drawings and paintings bucked against the prevailing trend of abstract expressionism, depicting wry, irreverent takes on the banality of the urban landscape. In 1962, Ruscha was included in New Painting of Common Objects at the Pasadena Art Museum, a show considered the first museum exhibition of Pop Art that included works by Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein and Wayne Thiebaud.




In 1963, the year Ruscha’s now-famous artist book Twentysix Gasoline Stations was published, he received his first solo show at Ferus Gallery in Los Angeles. Ruscha made sixteen artist books in the 1960s and 1970s, most of them comprised of photography taken in an antagonistically plain, documentary style, covering subjects such as swimming pools, parking lots and Every Building on the Sunset Strip (1966). In his photography and painting, Ruscha does not attempt to idealize his subjects, but rather stares deadpan at the ordinary objects and spaces that exist on the periphery of the experience of our surroundings. Ruscha is also celebrated for his approach to language, which is often amusing, incongruous and common, exploring the multiplicity of words and turning them into solid objects to be contemplated and played with.




Ruscha’s first major retrospective was in 1982 at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. The cover of the catalog featured a drawing he had made in 1979, with the text: “I don’t want no retro spective.” Ruscha continues to reside in his adopted city of Los Angeles, actively creating work that speaks to our rapidly changing contemporary landscape, the way we use language and our conception of the American ethos.